Page 32 of Theirs to Ruin

Razor greeted me with a firm handshake.

“Glad you came. Anyone fucking gives you a hard time, you let me know,” he rumbled in a low voice. “That includes Serpent.”

“Thanks,” I said. I studied Razor, and as usual, my feelings about the man were conflicted. He was usually a fair and effective leader, but he had a dark side that straddled the linebetween broody and sinister. I also knew he didn’t give a shit about me, only what I did for the club.

After Razor returned to his pool game, I took a seat near the bar, grabbed myself a beer, then sat facing the crowd. Most of the members didn’t seem to notice or care that I was there, but a few who I knew were tight with Serpent gave me dirty looks. I ignored them and focused on my drink.

Later, Vance and Talon arrived and joined me. We didn’t talk much but they made it clear they had my back. “He paid for Serpent. His slate is clean,” Vance said to a couple of bikers who tried to start some shit. “Fuck off.”

I grinned and shook my head. “Thanks, man, but I can take care of myself.”

“I know you can,” Vance said. “And so do they.”

“So why’d you do that?”

He shrugged. Then Talon, who hardly talked, grunted. “He’s looking for a fight.”

I glanced at Vance. “That right?”

“Not looking for one. But if someone started something, I wouldn’t mind.”

Since Vance wasn’t usually a hothead or a brawler, I wondered about that, but didn’t pry.

We drank for a while, and when I felt I’d finally put in enough time, I said my goodbyes and headed out, only to be stopped by a huge biker named Mad Dog.

“Want another beer?”

“Thanks, man, but I’ve got work in the morning,” I said.

“Meaning it’s beddie bye time already? Shit, Dante, you’re less than a decade older than those kids you counsel but you act like it’s fifty years. How about I get Marianne and Roxie in here? They’ve both been wanting their shot with you.”

Even though I’d rather eat nails, I grinned. “There’s always next time.”

“So you’re going home?”

I hesitated. I rarely spent the night on the MC compound but if I did tonight, that would double down on the message that I wasn’t going anywhere.

“Okay if I stay?” I asked. Since I wasn’t technically a member of the MC, I didn’t have an assigned room.

“No sweat off my back. You’re in luck because Missy just did laundry which means fresh sheets.”

Thank the fuck. One of the reasons I didn’t crash here often was because of how filthy some of the guest rooms got between cleanings. Plus, Mad Dog, Vance, and Talon aside, I hated most of the members. Coming here was just business.

“Later,” I said to Mad Dog then grabbed one of the open rooms in the back of the boarding house. As I washed up, I thought of Camille and how she’d hate me if she knew what I did for the MC.

No worse than she’d hate me if she knew how far I’d invaded her privacy.

I’d been watching over her since last year because even though she’d decided she didn’t need our sessions together anymore, I still needed her. From the moment we’d met, she’d calmed the darkness inside me, the voices that haunted me, even the one that told me I didn’t deserve to live. If it hadn’t been for her, I’d have finally offed myself last year on the anniversary of Rhianna’s death.

Camille’s father had ordered her to attend private counseling sessions when she came to CU. I was just lucky she’d been assigned to me and not one of the other counselors. At first, she was totally closed off, but she gradually opened up.

She told me how she’d been the one to find her mother’s body after she OD’d. She told me how much she missed her mom, how her dad didn’t understand her, and that she loved her sisterBianca but lived in her shadow. She told me everything—even about the fool in Italy who shattered her heart.

She also told me how sometimes she felt like she would never be the same after everything that had happened.

And I told her it was true—she’d never be the same. She’d be something even better.

She came to me utterly broken, carrying pieces of herself in a bucket. In that wreckage, I saw her strength even when all she saw was weakness.

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